Morning journal and courier., 1887-08-13
THE BLAKE LEASE EXPIRED.
A Plea for the Repairing of the Stat, HOuse--A Part of $275,OOO Lying Idle Suggested.

| A Plea for the Repairing of the State HOuse--A Part of $275,OOO Lying Idle Suggested.
 Our former State Capitol is modern, not an old edifce; it dates only from 1880. The seventeenth of June last very fitly celebrated the ending of the William P. Blake ten years lease of it given by Mayor Bigelow. Until then our city's hands had been tied and kept from meddling with the contract. Now the city is free to at once repair the structure and to relieve every one of us (men, women and children of New Haven and Con- necticuD from the shocking disgrace of such glaring, unsightly neglect. Beautiful: in
 spite of thirty years neglect, it deserves inn mediate best attention and needful action. The decisive vote to repair the building at a cost of $25, ,000 passed by the board of coun- cilmen and board of aldermen last year, is we'll known to the public. The appropria- tion committee refused to sanction the out lay for want of funds; that want exists no longer. Never was the city richer or more able to incur this needed expense.
 A committee of aldermen and councilmen who recommended the appropriation obtained nonresident builders and men of good busi- ness reputation to examine the building from chimnies, roof and skylights to the halls and \ all the rooms, including the unfinished attic story, the third and second stories, the base
 ment rooms and halls, the supports and foun- l dation walls, and to estimate the cost of re- pair. They reported $21 1000 sufficient On ! motion the sum was raised to $25, ,0OO ! and passed accordingly. Architects D. R. Brown, Major Patrick Maher, \ Superintendent Patrick Doyle are ready to ! contract for repairs restoring more than it's f original fitness and beauty for $12,0 Builder Charles Thompson, who laid the | floors and did the joiner work under the \ caves on each side, will make affidavit of the thoroughly good work done by him. Edward ! McGowan, safe mover, will testify to placing
 on the second floor eight safes weighing four \ tons each. One of this size and weight was \ last year rolled in over the front steps and paved porticos, through three-fourths of the | fire proof hard wood floors of the hall and | across the old large court room without hay \ ing mark or dent.
 Alderman Samuel H. Barnes testified that | his father, Wm. s. Barnes, worked on this building and saw all the material of the I walls; that they are made of red granite | from the East Haven quarry; that the outer part of each wall is of large, heavy pieces of stone, the inner part of small stone laid in cement; that the walls are now as firm and solid as the quarry itself, and that they grow frmer and harder every year. To this he has made affidavit.
 Our revered townsman Levi Ives, M. D., in his visits to Europe last year and the year previous procured and brought home photos graphic pictures of Grecian architecture in it's early and best days. Only the fronts of the two famed Grecian temples at Paesta, in Italy, remain. They are substantially the same as the front ends of our Capitol building.
 These facts about it our people need ever to keep in mind and to insist upon the State
 Houses immediate repair. The building is
 beautiful, substantial, historic, good for the
 best useful purposes The diagonal paths of
 the Green do not approach and lead to it.
 Transverse paths are needed for easy en-
 trance and access to both greens. The use
 and easy availability will then be apparent.
 It's central, commanding, beautiful situation
 is unequalled in our own historic city and is
 nowhere excelled. G, s.